Development of a fiber optic high temperature strain sensor

From 1 Apr. 1991 to 31 Aug. 1992, the Georgia Tech Research Institute conducted a research program to develop a high temperature fiber optic strain sensor as part of a measurement program for the space shuttle booster rocket motor. The major objectives of this program were divided into four tasks. Under Task 1, the literature on high-temperature fiber optic strain sensors was reviewed. Task 2 addressed the design and fabrication of the strain sensor. Tests and calibration were conducted under Task 3, and Task 4 was to generate recommendations for a follow-on study of a distributed strain sensor. Task 4 was submitted to NASA as a separate proposal

Calculation of AGARD Wing 445.6 Flutter Using Navier-Stokes Aerodynamics

An unsteady, 3D, implicit upwind Euler/Navier-Stokes algorithm is here used to compute the flutter characteristics of Wing 445.6, the AGARD standard aeroelastic configuration for dynamic response, with a view to the discrepancy between Euler characteristics and experimental data. Attention is given to effects of fluid viscosity, structural damping, and number of structural model nodes. The flutter characteristics of the wing are determined using these unsteady generalized aerodynamic forces in a traditional V-g analysis. The V-g analysis indicates that fluid viscosity has a significant effect on the supersonic flutter boundary for this wing

Capturing Natural Resource Dynamics in Top-Down Energy‑Economic Equilibrium Models

Top-down energy-economic modeling approaches often use deliberately simple techniques to represent heterogeneous resource inputs to production. We show that for some policies, such as feed-in tariffs (FIT) for renewable electricity, detailed representation of renewable resource grades is required to describe the technology more precisely and identify cost-effective policy designs. We extend a hybrid approach for modeling heterogeneity in the quality of natural resource inputs required for renewable energy production in a stylized computable general equilibrium (CGE) framework. Importantly, this approach resolves nearflat or near-vertical sections of the resource supply curve that translate into key features of the marginal cost of wind resource supply, allowing for more realistic policy simulation. In a second step, we represent the shape of a resource supply curve based on more detailed data. We show that for the case of onshore wind development in China, a differentiated FIT design that can only be modeled with the hybrid approach requires less than half of the subsidy budget needed for a uniform FIT design and proves to be more cost-effective.This work was supported by Eni S.p.A., ICF International, the French Development Agency (AFD), and Shell, founding sponsors of the MIT-Tsinghua China Energy and Climate Project. We are further thankful for support provided by the MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change through a consortium of industrial sponsors and U.S. federal grants. In particular, this work was supported by the DOE Integrated Assessment Grant (DE-FG02-94ER61937)

Radical Prostatectomy: An Option for High-Risk Prostate Cancer

Introduction. High-risk prostate cancer represents a therapeutic challenge. The role of radical prostatectomy (RP) in patients with extreme PSA values is under discussion. Material and Methods. We retrospectively analysed our data of 56 consecutive patients with preoperative PSA ≥ 40 mg/mL undergoing open radical retropubic prostatectomy from 1999 to 2009. Patient survival and time to PSA recurrence were recorded, and the Kaplan-Meier survival analysis was performed. Postoperative quality of life and functional status were investigated using a SF-12 questionnaire and determining the number of pads used per day. Results. Overall 56 patients were available for followup after a median time of 83.84 months. Locally advanced carcinoma was present in 84% while 16% of patients had organ-confined stages. A positive nodal status was observed in 46%. Overall survival was 95% at five and 81% at 10 years. Cancer-specific survival was 100% for five years and 83% for 10 years. Corresponding biochemical recurrence-free survival was low (52% and 11%, resp.). Quality of life and functional outcomes were favourable. Conclusions. In patients with PSA ≥ 40 mg/mL, RP allows long-term control, exact planning of adjuvant treatment, and identification of curable disease

Unexpected Features of Supersymmetry with Central Charges

It is shown that N=2 supersymmetric theories with central charges present some hidden quartic symmetry. This enables us to construct representations of the quartic structure induced by superalgebra representations.Comment: 14 pages, more details have been given, to appear in J. Phys.

Transaction Support for DataWeb Applications - A Requirement\u27s Perspective

W eb-based purely providing read-only access to information in terms of static HTML pages. Rather, more and more web-based information systems store (part of) the information within a database system (DBS) and generate HTML pages on demand. Such information systems are often called DataWeb Applications. Different users interact with the system, and often they perform changes concurrently. As an example in the area of electronic commerce, consider a web-based tourism information system, where an unpredictable number of a priori unknown tourists are allowed to book various tourism facilities at the same time. Whereas financial and security issues of such electronic commerce transactions are extensively discussed in literature, very few work exists on the database transaction aspect in terms of consistency and reliability of electronic commerce transactions and of DataWeb applications in general. The objective of this paper is to discuss the specific requirements that different architectures of DataWeb applications and the web itself pose on transaction management, and to identify promising technologies for enabling web transaction services

Analyzing the Regional Impact of a Fossil Energy Cap in China

Decoupling fossil energy demand from economic growth is crucial to China’s sustainable development. In addition to energy and carbon intensity targets enacted under the Twelfth Five-Year Plan (2011–2015), a coal or fossil energy cap is under discussion as a way to constrain the absolute quantity of energy used. Importantly, implementation of such a cap may be compatible with existing policies and institutions. We evaluate the efficiency and distributional implications of alternative energy cap designs using a numerical general equilibrium model of China’s economy, built on the 2007 regional input-output tables for China and the Global Trade Analysis Project global data set. We find that a national cap on fossil energy implemented through a tax on final energy products and an energy saving allowance trading market is the most costeffective design, while a regional coal-only cap is the least cost-effective design. We further find that a regional coal cap results in large welfare losses in some provinces. Capping fossil energy use at the national level is found to be nearly as cost effective as a national CO2 emissions target that penalizes energy use based on carbon content.We acknowledge the support of the Ministry of Science and Technology of China through the Institute for Energy, Environment, and Economy at Tsinghua University, and the support of the Graduate School at Tsinghua University, which are supporting Zhang Da’s doctoral research as a visiting scholar at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. We further thank Eni S.p.A., ICF International, Shell International Limited, and the French Development Agency (AFD), founding sponsors of the China Energy and Climate Project. We also grateful for support provided by the Social Science Key Research Program from National Social Science Foundation, China of Grant No. 09&ZD029 and by Rio Tinto China. We would further like to thank John Reilly, Sergey Paltsev, Kyung-min Nam, Henry Chen, Paul Kishimoto and Audrey Resutek for helpful comments, discussion and edits

A Self-Consistent Method to Assess Air Quality Co-Benefits from US Climate Policies

Air quality co-benefits can potentially reduce the costs of greenhouse gas mitigation. However, while many studies of the cost of greenhouse gas mitigation model the full macroeconomic welfare impacts, most studies of air quality co-benefits do not. We employ a US computable general equilibrium economic model previously linked to an air quality modeling system, and enhance it to represent the economy-wide welfare impacts of fine particulate matter. We present a first application of this method to explore the efficiency and the distributional implications of a clean energy standard (CES) and a cap–and–trade (CAT) program that both reduce CO2 emission by 10% in 2030 relative to 2006. We find that co-benefits from fine particulate matter reduction completely offset policy costs by 110% (40% to 190%), transforming the net welfare impact of the CAT into a gain of $1 (-$5 to $7) billion 2005 US$. For the CES, the corresponding co-benefit (median $8;$3 to $14)/tCO2 is a smaller fraction (median 5%; 2% to 9%) of its higher policy cost. The eastern US garners 78% and 71% of co-benefits for the CES and CAT, respectively. By representing the effects of pollution-related morbidities and mortalities as an impact to labor and the demand for health services, we find that the welfare impact per unit of reduced pollution varies by region. These interregional differences can enhance the preference of some regions, like Texas, for a CAT over a CES, or switch the calculation of which policy yields higher co-benefits, compared to an approach that uses one valuation for all regions. This framework could be applied to quantify consistent air quality impacts of other pricing instruments, subnational trading programs, or green tax swaps.The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support for this work provided by the MIT Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change through a consortium of industrial sponsors and Federal grants. Additionally, the authors acknowledge support from: the US EPA under the Science to Achieve Results (STAR) program (#R834279); MIT's Leading Technology and Policy Initiative; US Department of Energy Office of Science grant DE-FG02-94ER61937; the MIT Energy Initiative Total Energy Fellowship (Saari); and a MIT Martin Family Society Fellowship (Saari)

Creating Tsugaru Studies: The Paradox of Area Studies at the Local Level

There is, at present, an emerging body of academic research that is being called Tsugaru Studies. Taking place in the Tsugaru District of northern Japan, these efforts to create Tsugaru Studies have yielded numerous literary translations, two course textbooks, and a locally-produced periodical. This paper considers the content of this emerging Tsugaru Studies, assessing it on its academic characteristics and significance. While language is an important discriminating characteristic of the various genres of Tsugaru Studies, focus on the academic character of the works leads to the conclusion that a major portion of the English language published content can be viewed as limited to describing the characteristics of the place, whereas part of the Japanese language published content can be viewed as making contributions to more in-depth theorization. The implications reveal a paradox of Area Studies research: the work that is widely disseminated fails to advance Area Studies due to its focus on descriptive objectives whereas the work that is limited in exposure could make such contributions, but does not due to the language of publication